ORIGIN

Euro Motorsport Edition: 1990 VW Golf Limited

9/3/2009 Update: This VW has been re-listed here on Craigslist by the same seller for $15k.

From 8/31/2009:

This 1990 VW Golf is not your average US-spec 4-door model. This is one of 71 VW Motorsport Limited cars which featured supercharged G60 engines and Syncro all-wheel-drive. These were never brought into the USA, and this might be the only one in the country at this point, and it is even more rare than the Rally Golf which shares a similar drivetrain. Find it here on Craigslist in Watsonville, California for $18k. Special thanks to BaT reader Nick P. for this submission.

The simple grille with blue outline, 15″ BBS wheels, and 4-door body style were all part of the Limited package. It is odd that the best technology of the day was stuffed into a sleeper 4-door from the factory, but it makes us love it all the more.

This seller doesn’t go too far out of his way to clean the car before asking the highest price we have ever seen for an A2 Volkswagen. Even so, he does have a pretty rare specimen here. The title and registration issues will be an issue for the eventual buyer and the seller makes some bold suggestions, but maybe it could be registered on an exemption or a dealer plate. Don’t plan on ever seeing another one of these, and if this one was cleaned up it would make a killer daily driver.

First, I would like to thank IXXI(Grusse) for his illuminating post on a very foggy VW…

Second, I would like to thank all those who defended this little Golf from all the haters. Those that claim that this car cant take an STI or Evo, I have this to say. Power to weight will always win over raw power, just take a look at Lotus’ philosophy. Can you deny that they are incredibly underpowered given what they perform against?..

I worked for Mitsubishi as a car salesman, & in our auto group we also had a Subaru dealership. It was our job to know our cars, & considering that my friends & I all drove modified imports, we knew our s*!t. Ive driven more Evo’s in memory over greater distances than most owners in my area probably do(ever have to pick up an Evo from Pittsburg, then drive it back to NYC?.. I swear I was being punished…)…

I cant begin to tell you how many times I got f^*k#d with for driving a modded ’97 VW Mk3 Jetta 2.slow to work everyday. In all fairness, I loved that car with all the fiber of my soul. That’s part of the reason why I bought a ’95 Mk3 after I sold that one…

VW’s are like Sushi, not everyone may like them, but everyone can agree that some of them sure are interesting. & just like Sushi, for those that love them, they can be oh-so rewarding…

This fine example of a car belongs in a museum, not on the road. She has a history about her that needs to be preserved. I can only hope that the buyer realizes this…

In the mid 80Â´s Ralleying went with the Group B Cars over the top with cars having some 600HP at 800kgÂ´s Curb wight runing down the quartermile in 10 secounds on gravel, snow or ice. Then some bad accidents happed killing not only race drivers but also the cracy spectator crowd in south europe who liked to wait for the cars on the street and got surprised by the new generation wich where faster then the sound.. So in 1986 the Group B got sacked and the FIA startet in 1988 a Rallye 2000 Series wich was a special Group A Version limitet to relative small tire size and fixed engine power at minimum wight. VW already had some Group N FWD GolfII wich did very well and some Group B Twin engine (Pikes Peak cars) but as long Audi was dominating Group B VW wouldnÂ´t run against the Sistercompany an tried to dominate Group N (wich was then Toyota GTS16V Land)

VW allready had Twin engine and Syncro Prototypes runing and the Group N had the situation that the FWD 1800 GTI16V was on the end from the development and most Competitors moved to AWD Cars in Group N based on Group A Series cars.

The Difference between Divison A and N ist that N Cars har to use Stock parts while Group A could use revised parts. One key was the transmission, on N Series the Trany had to keep stock with the gears the factory once selectet for the production run.

Now VW allready hat a Turbo engine and the new G60 engine ready for production. Both engines had some good and some bad aspects but for Group N the G60 was much better as it gave more tourqe at the low end over any turbosetup. The bad side was that the G60 peak power was under Turbo level but VW thought to make the 300HP within the time wenn the project hit the road.

VW decided to join with the Golf Rallye. Meant to be built upon a stock body with 5000 Production units VW had made 5000 Rallye Golfs based on the Golf Syncro with wider Fender and some chassis upgrades as base car for Group N and Group A. Chosing the G60 was a clever deal as the G60 had better performance then any other compressor and made less trouble compared to a Turbo within the same power envelope.

While the Golf Rallye was produced in Gent they found that the G60 with the 8V Head will not have more then 280HP top power. If they tried to genereate more boost with the G-Blower the units failed. So VW used the 16V head with the G60 Block and managed easy 300HP (wich was the Group limit).

At the same Time Audi quit on factory Rally leaving VW that area. So VW decided to pusch into Group A as well runing with the big boys.

The FIA Rules had a loophole for Group A cars based on Group N. Based on a Group N 5000 you could built an improved Group A version based on the Group N and a additional 200 Units. This is where the WRC Cars startet. So while te 5000 production run VW built another 200 Chassis for the Group A Divsisions and they used the 16VG60 with some revised parts, again reinforced Bodystructur, better Axle setup, beffier trany and better Torson Setup.

Now on those 200 Cars VW used 80 units to built up the Group N 8VG60 Cars wich partly competet in Rallye 2000 outfit. Some 50 units where bare rolling chassis wich went to severeal Coachbuilders (Vario I & Vario II) and 71 cars where built as 4 Door fully loaded Edition.

While the Rallye Syncro was built in Gent all the Race/Rallyecars and the Edition Series where built at VW Motorsport in Hanover. After the Edition hit the road an was testet by the Carmgas VW got over 100 orders on 16VG60 especialy from Switzerland and France wich helped to put the G60 Syncro in production but Mother VW (Piech?) allready had sacked the Golf II Rallye cars and focused on the new Golf III Rallye Kit Car and the new VR6 Top of the line engine.

The thing with the 16VG60 was it could outperform the new VR6es even the 2,9L 24V with projectet 240HP. The other knack was that the G60 Loader had a shorter lifetime as exceptet especially as the mjority from the Owners installed the VW Motorsport Wheel or a even faster Tuner unit pushing stock G60 up to 220HP. Wich was fine but G60 Blower units at high revs and Load tend to explode and most G60 owners blamed VW for that failure.

If you look on the website, the car is known to be in the seller’s hands so anywhere else other than the good ol’ USA would be no problem with a bill of sale. Another option would be to get a dealer’s license where you live and drive it, unregistered, with dealer’s plates. Anyway, it’s a real car, is extremely rare and the fact that it’s performance is not up to current standards is irrelevant as is so with any historic vehicle.

This comment will probably go unread since it’s about an archived listing. I don’t intend to insult anyone who commented but you guys sure are ignorant. Ignorant, meaning uninformed. These are extremely rare 100% VAG factory cars. here is a website devoted entirely to them: http://www.vw-racing.org/ . These are much rarer than Chevy COPO Camaros, as in the case of the Camaros were built using the manufacturer’s entire part’s bin for all ot performance and this seller is asking $15,000(currently) rather than the upwards to $1,000,000 that Camaros command. The lack of paperwork would mainly be a problem in the US due to DOT auto import rules. This car is so unique that it couldn’t bge easily(if at all) imported to the USA. I’m sure that the car is in the US illegally

Chris H: you don’t know what you are looking at, so just stop posting.

“sombodyâ€™s saying this car can â€œwhoopâ€ a wrx ???????” yes. it’s called power-to-weight. look it up.

sucks it doesn’t have paperwork and the pricetag is so inflated, this is the dream car of any real dub-head like myself. maybe the only one I’d take over it is the mk3 A59 of which only 1 exists in the VW museum in Wolfsburg.

Chris H. said: “The G60 was never mated to a 16v at the factory as far as I know, and the seats look suspiciously like Mark III Golf units. Wouldnâ€™t be hard to clone this one (synchro not withstanding)for 1/4 of the asking.”

I mentioned already this is the real deal. Only 71 cars where offered with the 16v g60(the golf limited). There is no “execution” this is #50 of 71 made. The only turn off to me is not haveing paper work. This is the crown jewel of any h20 dub collector. “sombodyâ€™s saying this car can â€œwhoopâ€ a wrx ???????” with different pulley and hard ware,yes we can.

@jimmythefly: Ahem, ah, well, actually several years prior to that. The prototype Rabbit/Jetta synchro cars I drove were stock stock ride height or even slightly lower, and there was even a turbocharged Quantum synchro wagon with a little hood scoop and everything. VW’s engineers were on our side, even if the product planners weren’t.

I am amazed to see this car over here legally and yes it appears to be genuine and are as rare as hens teeth even in Europe… kudos to Robert Fletcher as he is the only one that coomented on here that knows what the engine in this car really is… this is a car you need in your VW stable next to your Rallye Golf and Oettinger 16S Mk1.

Too many little details that might not add up, and the lack of documentation means forget ever driving it legally in the US. And the listing does seem to be deleted at this time. Whew! Here’s one that I won’t have to add to my “BaT cars I would have bought”.

Link was celeted from Craigslist…Hmmm… Anyhoo, as interesting as this, the price is waaaaay out of line. You could go overt to VW Vortex and find a few dozen cars more decently executed, priced better, and still street legal. More than a few things were fishy as stated above. The G60 was never mated to a 16v at the factory as far as I know, and the seats look suspiciously like Mark III Golf units. Wouldn’t be hard to clone this one (synchro not withstanding)for 1/4 of the asking.

I really liked my ’89 Jetta and put 180k miles on it in 12 years, but $18k would buy a really nice Audi S4 v6 twin turbo from about 2000 or 2001, and those have real performance, OK a bit modern. New or old is always a hard one to choose. Either would be intersting and fun, but the Audi’s performance is really an eye-opener, and the G-lader is just kinda so-so in my limited experience (drove a Corrado G-60 once) But this is unique in the US, and that’s kinda fun. But the Audi has probably twice the hp, don’t know why.

“The engine pic i a bit suspect as well. the G60 engine was an 8 valve single cam 1.8l and this car has the DOHC 16valve. There are afretmarket kits to run the G60 charger on the 16v, it was never a factory option as far as I know.” The 16v g60 was a factory option for the 71 or so golf limiteds made. Bahn Brenner Motorsports(BBM) made a kit that mimicked this engine. “but the performance numbers arnâ€™t that hot anymore” I disagree it’s almost as fast as the r32 and far more tunable. This motor in the right hands can produce over 300hp and whoop a heavier wrx or evo’s ass. “G60? Pass. Youâ€™re better off throwing a live hand grenade under the hood. Had a couple VWs in my dayâ€¦..never again.” While not the greatest super charger ever made, with good synthetic and maintenance they’ve been know to last ove 100k. However if i where to poney up the $ for a car like this i’d get a twin screw set-up from BBM. If i had the $ to pony up I’d be all over this. However I don’t want to fork up upwards of 18k only to have D.O.T. have me destroy it or to find out it was stolen. While i know of the peeps who have this and doubt they’d be dealing with a stolen car knowingly, who’s to say the person they got it from wasn’t a crook.

So, this car along with the synchro and rallyes were the among the ones to get me interested in working on cars as a teen. A friend of mine at the time made fwd “rally” car out of his Rabbit after we’d seen these in magazines. I always wanted one, so when the R32 came out in ’04, I convinced my wife that she needed one. She now appreciates autos. I can only imagine what an R32 on a diet would be like. My comment on the motor – I had a supercharged Corrado, never had a problem with the G-lader in the 9 years I owned it. Some of the other components…. not so lucky (anybody ever figure out what went wrong with the 2nd gear synchro?). Anyway, no paperwork = no deal.

There’s a guy here in town building a similar car starting with an ’83 Rabbit GTI (U.S., built in Westmoreland, like mine was) but with the Synchro system and warmed-over VR6, seam welded, all leather, new electronics, etc. Should be fun. He budgeted around $8k, and figures to do it for $5k. And it’ll be legal, unlike this one. I ran the VW club convention when we had it at the Westmoreland plant, and can tell you that VW toyed around with putting Synchro under Rabbits and Jettas and Golfs and etc. for years; I even drove a couple factory prototypes. But they just didn’t think we would pay for it here in the U.S., and maybe they were right … next to the wonderfully lively first-gen GTI, they felt heavy and unresponsive and probably would have cost a ton.

The engine pic i a bit suspect as well. the G60 engine was an 8 valve single cam 1.8l and this car has the DOHC 16valve. There are afretmarket kits to run the G60 charger on the 16v, it was never a factory option as far as I know.

That being said, a supercharged 16v would make this car an absolute RIPPER in the dirt!

As someone who had built a similar motor for my car, I can guess why not many of these were produced. Disappointing supercharger performance, difficult serpentine belt routing and tension, and a nice placement of the alternator- right over the exhaust manifold…

The interior picture shows a sunroof panel, but unless my eyes deceive me the exterior shots show no sunroof. Fishy?

It doesn’t appear the provenance of this car is well known here. This is a VERY special Golf built by VW Motorsport. Not just a G60 but the only factory 16V G60 AND AWD! Extremely rare and definitely collectable. For the first time ever I was thinking about writing a check for a car on this website. Too bad about the no documents though.

All the other issues aside, having owned a 75 rabbit, 82 rabbit, 80 caddy, 86 GTI, and 91 Jetta, I gotta say the engines and transmissions lasted, and performed, the cars were sporty and fun to drive, the CIS, & CIS-E fuel injection was trouble free, BUT, the Digifant FI was rotten, the interiors had way too much plastic, vinyl over cardboard, etc., and simply self destructed, wiring was way too complicated, and generally they were suprisingly “throw-away” for something so “German”. VW lost me with the 91 Jetta, I’ve unloaded them all save the ’86 GTI, which although a real survivor and work horse, also has to go for the dissolving interior issues. (ever try to restore one of those molded “fiberglss-board” headliners? it’ll drive you to homicide as it cracks apart in your hands! it’s a shame VW abandoned the early bug philosophy of giving high quality, although in small portions. The later cars are just plain cheap construction in too many ways. I’ll not ever own another, and unfortunately this advertised car no matter how unusual, is still from the same company, utilizing the same construction methods, and therfore, ultimately no different in my book, wouldn’t take it if it was for free, honest, so much for brand loyalty.

If it had its paperwork, I’d say its worth it for a diehard A2 nut. This thing has a lot over a normal A2 and it’s a complete package rather than the usual 1.8T or VR6 swap which still leaves you stuck with a lightweight, high power FWD car that’ll never handle particularly well. Retrofitting the rear floor pan/suspension to get syncro is a hell of a project. It’s a German made Golf, rather than the US/Mexican A2’s we had, so the build should be on par with the later German Jettas (which were VASTLY better made). The G60 is a great motor to drive behind when it’s been tuned beyond what the Corrado had.

Wow, no paperwork… none, period. How could you ever register this car anywhere, even outside the US? How do you know its not stolen? His suggestion of using the plates from the other car works great until you have an accident, then you find yourself uninsured and in very deep shtuff! This car is scary, but I love that you can find it on BAT! It makes for interesting reading.

I love German cars from the 70s and 80s, so I really want to love this one, but…

The limited production number and rarity are what this has going for it, as well as condition, but the performance numbers arn’t that hot anymore, the G60 is nothing special, and given there are still a ton of the plain jane A2 Golfs and Jettas out there (awesome lil’ cars) it lacks the visual cache of say the earlier A1 or something water-cooled (though I’m sure its a ton of fun to drive). The lack of documentation is another pain to deal with at the price point.

Interesting, Wiki lists the 0-60 time at some 6.4 seconds, quite a bit quicker than the time the seller states.

For comparison, I paid significantly less for my 89 Alpina B10 3.5 5-spd, and although they made more of them (some 572) I’ll take an Alpina’d M30 over a G60 longterm anyday, not to mention the e34 chassis vs. the A2 Golf chassis.

I wish the seller all the best – very cool car if it were cheaper, though if it all checks out, 5 figure price tag is ok with me, just not 18k. I’m not a VW guy however, so I could be out to lunch!